This invention relates to a device for diabetes management and more particularly to a hand-held electronic device for determining a proper insulin dosage based upon the content of carbohydrates in foods ingested by a user.
Control of certain health conditions typically involves the frequent monitoring of the health of a person. In order to monitor the health conditions the person is required to participate at a high and consistent level. One health condition which needs to be monitored is diabetes. For the care of diabetes it has been important to monitor the blood glucose level of the individual and to somehow record the level along with the date and time of the monitoring. Additionally, it is useful to be able to track diet, exercise, and medication of the diabetic in order to correctly and effectively determine if any change to the diabetic's therapy will be needed.
There have been some electronic devices which have been proposed and used in the past to monitor blood glucose which were inexpensive and easy to use. However, such devices are only able to monitor the blood glucose level and cannot monitor other conditions such as diet or exercise. Additionally, there have been developed microprocessor based blood glucose monitoring systems. However, such systems have several disadvantages. For example, such microprocessor based systems have only limited capability in being able to monitor what kind of meal was eaten prior to the blood glucose reading being taken.
In the management of diabetes it has been found that it is advantageous to monitor a patient's eating and exercise to determine the optimum insulin dosage required for that patient. With respect to monitoring a patient's eating it is extremely important to monitor the amount of carbohydrates which plays a critical role in determining the blood glucose level. Research has confirmed that if diabetic patients can control their blood glucose levels effectively they will reduce risk in developing many of the health complications well known in diabetes.
Controlling the diet is the cornerstone of diabetes management and in recent years greater attention has been focused on meals and the amount of carbohydrates consumed. This is because it has been recognized that the amount of carbohydrates consumed in a diet is the single largest contributor to the body's glucose level after a meal. The only method known to record such information has been by writing it down in a log book. Additionally, the recording of such information is very subjective and requires the user to guess at various amounts of carbohydrates actually eaten. Due to the subjective nature of this method, the proper insulin dosage may not be calculated accurately.
The present invention is designed to provide a diabetic patient with a reliable and accurate tool to measure the amount of carbohydrates prior to consumption of a meal. With such information the diabetic patient is able to calculate an appropriate insulin dose to administer prior to a meal. The present invention further serves as an educational tool to make a patient aware of the importance of carbohydrates consumed. The patient, with continued use of the device of the present invention, may be trained to evaluate carbohydrate content of foods so that the patient will in time have the ability to better understand dosage requirements based on diet. Additionally, health care professionals will be better able to assist their patients in complying with the patient's prescribed guidelines for diet management if the amount of carbohydrates consumed by the patient is known. The device also provides a record whereby diet and other components of care can be evaluated and modified by the health care professional as needed. The record or data which is stored within the device for diabetes management is capable of being downloaded to a remote site for access and review by a health care professional or physician. Additionally, other records are capable of being received by the device for diabetes management from a remote site for use by the diabetic patient. Moreover, the device for diabetes management of the present invention enables an individual to factor in other variables besides carbohydrate food content such as other factors being exercise and existing glucose levels which also impact glucose control. Additional other factors are, for example, variation of insulin sensitivity during the course of the day or the different effect on blood glucose levels by different foods of the same food category of equivalent caloric value. Foods from the same food group may nevertheless alter glucose levels in a differing manner can be said to have different glycemic indexes. The use of the glycemic index control on the device allows this variant to be considered when calculating carbohydrate intake or insulin requirements. The device of the present invention allows for more accurately determining the dosage of insulin for a diabetic.